Two parents and their 7-year-old daughter were detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents after the family sought medical help for the child in Portland, Oregon.
The child, Diana Crespo, suffered a prolonged nosebleed on Jan. 15. The following morning, Diana went with her parents — Darianny Liseth Gonzalez De Crespo and Yohendry De Jesus Crespo — to urgent care at Portland Adventist Health. In the facility’s parking lot, immigration officers detained the family, Oregon Public Broadcasting (OPB) and Noticias Noroeste reported.
Family friends told OPB that Diana and her parents are now being held at ICE’s South Texas Family Residential Center in Dilley. The facility is the same location where Liam Conejo Ramos, the 5-year-old boy who drew national attention after being detained by ICE agents in Minnesota, is being held, according to CNN.
A GoFundMe page set up by Darianny’s friend, Stephanie Melendez, alleges that “ICE agents forced them out of the car,” and claims the family was unable to have Diana seen by a doctor at the urgent care. The page adds that the family is being held without money and needs assistance covering legal fees, food, and other essentials while detained.
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“Darianny and Yohendry are a couple full of dreams and goals, honest and hardworking people who came to this country to work and give their daughter Diana a good future,” Melendez wrote.
A friend of the family, identified as Ana, told OPB and The Chronicle that Yohendry, 40, Darianny, 34, and Diana arrived in the United States from Venezuela a little over a year ago. Darianny’s sister told OPB the family left Venezuela due to fears tied to the country’s government. “Most of us who left, who emigrated, did so because of that fear,” she said.
Ana told OPB and The Chronicle that the family first moved to Utah, then relocated in October to live with her family because of increased immigration enforcement in that state. She said they entered the U.S. in California after an appointment with U.S. Customs and Border Protection.
According to Ana, the family has a pending asylum application, and both Yohendry and Darianny received permits to work legally in the U.S. She also said they were still trying to secure a lawyer after the detention.
Portland Adventist Health’s communications manager, CJ Anderson, told OPB in a statement that the facility was not aware ICE was detaining the family.
“No law enforcement agency contacted us, and we did not coordinate with any agency,” he said. “Adventist Health Portland is here for our community, open, available and ready to provide care when it’s needed most. Patient care remains our priority, regardless of circumstance.”
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Ana told OPB that Diana remained ill after the detention. She also said the child did not see a doctor for several days after arriving at ICE’s South Texas Family Residential Center, though she is now doing better.
The detention appears to be among the first instances in Oregon involving an entire family being taken into custody, Portland Immigrants Rights Coalition coordinator Alyssa Walker Keller told OPB. “It’s horrific this happened, and [it’s] a new, unsettling dynamic to see a family unit detained like this in Oregon,” she said.
Both ICE and Portland Adventist Health did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Saturday, Jan. 24.
